28 THE CHRYSANTHEMUM 



apparent, then nature, as it were, comes to the rescue 

 with renewal of growth continued for a few weeks, 

 when another bud appears. There is a period when 

 man can safely arrest the natural course of things and 

 by timely selection of bud and manipulation of growth 

 secure a larger flower than would be ordinarily pro- 

 duced were the plant left to its own inclination and 

 permitted to continue on to that stage of completed 

 growth and final bud formation. 



To make the nature and time of appearance of the 

 several buds thoroughly understood, we must, in imag- 

 ination, follow the plant through its course of growth. 

 If the 'plants were planted, as advised, early in May, 

 they will have attained a length of about eighteen 

 inches by the middle of June and for a few days 

 growth apparently ceases. A close examination will 

 show that a flower bud has formed at the top of the 

 growing plant right in the point of the shoot; this bud 

 would not attain to maturity, therefore no thought is 

 given to selecting it. It makes what growers tech- 

 nically call the first break, and appropriately so, be- 

 cause it is a break in the continuity of growth which 

 ceases at the point of the bud's formation. These buds 

 may be pinched out, although this is not an absolute 

 necessity, as the plant immediately proceeds to de- 

 velop other shoots which spring from the axil or base 

 of the leaf stalk of the leaves just below the bud. A 

 number of these new growths appear, all of which 

 could, of course, be continued and would grow up and 

 produce flowers. Our object, however, is one large 

 bloom on a single stem, therefore the plant's energies 

 must be again directed in a single channel by the 

 selection of one of the several shoots and the removal 

 of the others. The best placed shoot nearest to the 

 bud, which generally is the second shoot below the bud, 



